New 2d Shooter Radio Flare now available for iPhone and iPod Touch

Posted by John as 2d Shooter

Introducing the first iPhone game created Studio Radiolaris, Radio Flare hits App store this weekend.  Get your hands on this musical shooter for only $4.99 where you destroy enemies in sync with the beat.  Radio Flare is currently available for iPhone and iPod Touch.

The 2d shooter game is developed as a traditional side-scrolling shooter with an end goal of annihilating enemy ships and avoids incoming fire shot at you by enemies.  You gain a radio flare after every destroyed enemy.  These radio flares must be collected so as to progress to the next levels.  Enjoy Radio Flare having 5 stages with the final stage as a special boss fighting finale.

In Radio Flare, your space ship is equipped with a sonification beam that desynchronizes space debris, as well as an entire alien invasion force. Propelled by radio flares, your ship speeds pulsing through deep space, taking you on a journey into sound. The game features an interactive electronica track from Berlin based electronic musician DJ Glow (Trust Records).

The “sonification beam” wipes out enemies in your way and renders a bit of musical accompaniment to the soundtrack.  It is a good idea to wear your headphones to better appreciate the music of Radio Flare.  The primary feature of the 2d shooter game is the musical interaction was a bit of a disappointment in its setting.  The pulsating music contributes to the immersiveness and “feel” to the game yet uncertainly at the same level of Rez and related musical shooters before the release of Radio Flare.

Radio Flare offers easy navigation which involves the use of your left thumb to provide direct movement control of your spacecraft with the other thumb used for targeting.  The way you target enemies is similar to Space Deadbeef in which you can target multiple enemies with the swipe of a finger.

Side-scrolling shooters have been unsatisfactorily represented on the App Store with the most notable game Platypus most easily recalled.  Radio Flare as a scrolling shooter was a surprisingly good experience.  The direct touch control on your ship permits a quick maneuver to move around enemies and to avoid incoming fire.  The mechanics of the game is relatively easy to love but the limited game play is another issue.  The game play value is quite limited with its 5 stages offering with the first three stages fairly easy to get through.

The combination of its musical interaction and scrolling shooter makes Radio Flare a good but fairly short game.  Fans of any musical shmup may find this game quite disappointing however scrolling shooter fans may find Radio Flare as good find for the $4.99 price and playable in their iPhone and iPod Touch units.  Though, it may not fall into any “must-have” category for players having only a casual interest in the genres.

Technorati Tags: 2d Shooter, iPhone, iPod Touch, Radio Flare

Yuletide Tidings from your friends at 2d Shooter blog!

Posted by John as Shmups

The staff of 2d Shooter blog wishes readers a fun and merrymaking Christmas and New Year together with families and friends. Cheers to another fun filled and exciting shmup time this coming new year.

Technorati Tags: christmas greetings yuletide wishes

Death Smiles only coming to Japanese Xbox 360 owners

Posted by John as Shmups

Here’s good news to shmup fanatics: Cave is bringing Gothic Lolita arcade shmup Death Smiles to the Xbox 360, coming only to Japanese Xbox 360 owners to be exact. Death Smiles may not as insane as other games by Cave, this shmup does put a nice spin on the horizontal shooter by letting players shoot objects coming in from the right and the left. Death Smiles arrives in two editions: A ¥7140 (US$70) regular edition and a ¥9240 Limited Edition one. The Limited Edition version comes in a special box designed by Junya Inoue, who did the character work for Death Smiles as well as other shooters like BATSUGUN. A special soundtrack CD is thrown in the Limited Edition version. Cave is currently 60 percent until completely done with the development of the Xbox 360 version. Death Smiles is slated for a release in Spring 2009 in Japan.

Technorati Tags: 2d Shooter, cave shooter, xbox 360 shmup

Digg Attack – A Unique 2d Shooter Uses Digg to Power Enemies

Posted by John as 2d Shooter

Click to play Digg Attack!

Now here is an original 2d shooter where the steady flow of enemies depends on stories that are “dugg”. What perhaps is the most innovative use of social media, Digg Attack uses Digg API to create different anti-heroes characters that need to be shot down.

The Javascript based 2d shooter game, Digg Attack, connects to Digg.com and as stories are dugg, enemies are spawned and enter the screen at the left or right side. You begin each level with a number of heroes in little bluish specks. The swarm of protagonists arrives in the form of a small flock of social media heroes, can be controlled by targets set by the player and influenced by various objects on the map.

Levels of Digg Attack
This 2d shooter has a total of 12 levels with a combined game time of 15 minutes and 10 seconds. The ultimate goal is to achieve the highest possible score by the time the last level is done. The first level is a basic empty playing field. As the levels progress, the field features blocking structures, attractors/deflectors, zappers and even small black holes.

The first level is just an empty playing field. Later levels feature blocking structures. Here’s a quick overview of what you could be facing:

Blocks: These are simple impassable structures that block your path and/or divide the map in smaller sections.

Directors: Your heroes will suddenly move in the direction of the arrow within the range of a director. They come in 4 flavors: up, down, left and right.

Attractors: Attractors are almost the same with directors. Once your heroes move close to an attractor, they lose their sense of direction and are compelled to move towards the center of the attractor. Be careful as it can be hard to escape once you’ve become trapped.

Repulsors: The repulsors enable your heroes to move away from the point where the repulsors are.

Zapper: Aim to avoid a Zapper at all costs. Your magnificent heroes will be toasted once within range of these high powered electrical menaces. Fortunately it takes a second before the zapper is ready again.

Vortex: Vortex are miniature black holes with a strong gravitational pull dragging your heroes to the midst of blank space where nothing and everything meet and the very fabric of space time is torn apart.

Since Digg Attack is a JavaScript canvas based game, it runs smoothly in Firefox 3 but appears to be working in Opera 9.6 and Safari as well. For any graphical glitches while playing Digg Attack in Safari, try with a recent Webkit nightly. Internet Explorer shouldn’t be used to play this 2d shooter.

Click to play Digg Attack!

Technorati Tags: Digg, Digg Attack, Javascript 2d shooter game

Microsoft Holds 2D Shooting Festival

Posted by John as Shmups

“Space Invaders” as the mothers of all shmups traces back its roots in Japan.  It’s no wonder Microsoft held the 2d shooting festival in the “Land of the Rising Sun” or Japan last December 5, 2008.  The latest gaming event dubbed as the Xbox 360 Shooting Fiesta, lured the hard core genre of Xbox 360 into arcade-style shmup spree.

The Japanese arcade-style 2d shooters managed to show off their skills at the massive FujiSoft complex in Akihabra.  The shooting fanatics registered in advance for a 2-hour intense shooting fun festival.  Part of the shooting festival was for all players to try out Xbox 360 shooters both old and new.  The list of Xbox 360 shooters includes upcoming titles like DoDonPachi Daioujou Black Label X, Shooting Love 200X, Ketsui Kizuna Jigoku-tachi Extra, and R-Type Dimensions.

The spotlights at the event were both Death Smiles and DoDonPachi.  Death Smiles, an updated port of an October 2007 arcade title, didn’t fail to surprise shooting fanatics when made in a playable form. It was a nice catch enough to attract practically everybody in attendance to line up and sample it for a good five minutes.  All players who tried out Death Smiles walked home carrying a special collector’s mug.  DoDonPachi was recently delayed of its release in Japan from its December 25 release to winter. The score attack tournament highlighted the 2d Shooting Festival with DoDonPachi as the chosen shmup.  The champion of the score attack tournament was Mon who managed to clear the required stage of play with almost 3 billion points and edged out RadiantSilver’s points of around 2 and a half billion points.  Mon won for himself a new fighting stick from Hori and a surprise gift of a collection of five Xbox 360 shooters.

Microsoft‘s key staff members, Tsuneki Ikeda and Junya Inoue, appeared for a short talk session.  Ikeda released a major announcement that the latest arcade Death Smiles, a Mega Black Label, will be released to the Xbox 360 as download content for the 360 Death Smiles release.  The said download content will arrive comes spring coinciding with the retail release date.

The first major revelation of the event was the Japanese release of PowerUp Forever, having its origins outside Japan and developed by BlitzGames.  By December 10, Bandia Namco will publish the Xbox Live Arcade shooter in Japan. In America, the release date of this game both for XBLA and Playstation Network has yet to be announced.

The Xbox 360 Shooting Fiesta shows that there’s also plenty of homegrown shooting content for Japanese gamers, propelling the 360 as the current king of one of the gaming industry’s most hardcore genres.

Technorati Tags: 2d Shooter, death smiles, DoDonPochi, japan, Microsoft 2d shooting festival, xbox 360 live arcade

Soldner-X hits PlayStation Network on 12/4

Posted by John as Shmups

The delayed release of Soldner-X: Himmelsstiirmer is inching closer to the North American Playstation Network on the 4^th of December. At a low price of $9.99, get your hands on this explosive-heavy, side-scrolling shooter packed with several new features not found in the original PC version release.

Set in the distant future, this shmup showcases 1080p graphical improvement, 2 player co-op support, new opponents and boss battles, leaderboard and Trophy support. Experience true arcade action and fun in Soldner X’s storyline where planet Earth’s resistance aims to put a stop to a deadly infection threatening to destroy life form and technology. Fulfill your goal as you fight your way to the origin of the virus, save human civilization and earn cash to boot in this traditional 2d shoot em up game.

Check out this full trailer of Soldner X.

Technorati Tags: 2d Shooter, shmup, side scroller, soldner-x, video game